Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-gxg78 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-29T06:45:20.808Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The motivational basis of constituency work: how intrinsic and extrinsic motivations interact

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 May 2019

Nathalie Giger Open the ORCID record for Nathalie Giger [Opens in a new window] ,
Simon Lanz  and
Catherine de Vries
Nathalie Giger
Affiliation:
Department of political science, University of Geneva, Geneve, Switzerland
Simon Lanz
Affiliation:
Department of political science, University of Geneva, Geneve, Switzerland
Catherine de Vries*
Affiliation:
Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
*
*Corresponding author. E-mail: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Behavioral economists and social psychologists have shown that extrinsic motivations can crowd out intrinsic motivations to act. This study examines this crowding out effect in the context of legislative behavior. By exploiting the federal nature of Swiss elections, we examine if response rates to requests of voters residing inside or outside a candidate's district vary based on the electoral competition candidate legislators face. We report two main findings. First, we find a high response rate among Swiss candidates (66 percent) which remains high for voters who reside outside a candidate's district (59 percent) suggesting that intrinsic motivations are a key driver of constituency effort. Second, the response to voters who reside inside a candidate's district is more pronounced for candidates confronted with a high degree of electoral competition. This suggests that extrinsic motivations are important for constituency work, but at the same time their presence might crowd out intrinsic motivations. This evidence suggests that the relationship between electoral competition and responsiveness might be less straightforward than assumed.

Keywords

Comparative politicsindustrialized countrieselections and campaignsEuropean politics and integrationfield experiments
Type
Original Articles
Information
Political Science Research and Methods , Volume 8 , Issue 3 , July 2020 , pp. 493 - 508
Copyright
Copyright © The European Political Science Association 2019

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Ashworth, S and de Mesquita, EB (2006) Delivering the goods: legislative particularism in different electoral and institutional settings. Journal of Politics 68, 168–179.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Benabou, R and Tirole, J (2003) Intrinsic and extrinsic motivation. The Review of Economic Studies 70, 489–520.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Beretti, A, Figuiares, C and Grolleau, G (2013) Using money to motivate both saints and sinners: a field experiment on motivational crowding-out. Kyklos 66, 63–77.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brambor, T, Clark, WR and Golder, M (2006) Understanding interaction models: improving empirical analyses. Political Analysis 14, 63–82.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Broockman, DE (2013) Black politicians are more intrinsically motivated to advance blacks' interests: a field experiment manipulating political incentives. American Journal of Political Science 57, 521–536.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Butler, DM (2014) Representing the Advantaged: How Politicians Reinforce Inequality. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Butler, DM and Broockman, DE (2011) Do politicians racially discriminate against constituents? A field experiment on state legislators. American Journal of Political Science 55, 463–477.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Butler, DM, Karpowitz, CF and Pope, JC (2012) A field experiment on legislators' home styles: service versus policy. The Journal of Politics 74, 474–486.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Butler, D, Naurin, E and Öhberg, P (2017) Party representatives' adaptation to election results: Dyadic responsiveness revisited. Comparative Political Studies 50, 1973–1997.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cain, B, Ferejohn, J and Fiorina, M (1987). The personal vote: Constituency service and electoral independence. Cambridge (Mass.): Harvard University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cain, BE, Ferejohn, JA and Fiorina, MP (1984) The constituency service basis of the personal vote for us representatives and British members of parliament. American Political Science Review 78, 110–125.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Carey, JM and Shugart, MS (1995) Incentives to cultivate a personal vote: a rank ordering of electoral formulas. Electoral Studies 14, 417–439.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Costa, M (2017) How responsive are political elites? A meta-analysis of experiments on public officials. Journal of Experimental Political Science 4, 241–254.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dahl, R (1971) Polyarchy : Participation and Opposition. New Haven: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Deci, E (1975) Intrinsic Motivation. New York: Plenum Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Deci, E and Ryan, RM (2000) Intrinsic Motivation and Self-Determination in Human Behavior. New York: Plenum Press.Google Scholar
Downs, A (1957) An Economic Theory of Democracy. New York: Harper and Row.Google Scholar
Dropp, K and Peskowitz, Z (2012) Electoral security and the provision of constituency service. The Journal of Politics 74, 220–234.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fehr, E and Falk, A (1999) Wage rigidity in a competitive incomplete contract market. Journal of Political Economy 107, 106–134.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fiorina, MP (1977) Congress : Keystone of the Washington Establishment. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Frey, B and Oberholzer-Gee, F (1997) The cost of price incentives: an empirical analysis of motivational crowding-out. American Economic Review 87, 746–755.Google Scholar
Gerber, AS and Green, DP (2012) Field Experiments: Design, Analysis, and Interpretation. New York: WW Norton.Google Scholar
Gneezy, U and Rustichini, A (2000) A fine is a price. Journal of Legal Studies 29, 1–17.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Grimmer, J (2013) Appropriators not position takers: the distorting effects of electoral incentives on congressional representation. American Journal of Political Science 57, 624–642.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Grose, CR (2014) Field experimental work on political institutions. Annual Review of Political Science 17, 355–370.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Heitshusen, V, Young, G and Wood, DM (2005) Electoral context and mp constituency focus in Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom. American Journal of Political Science 49, 32–45.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kam, CD and Franzese, RJ (2007) Modeling and Interpreting Interactive Hypotheses in Regression Analysis. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.Google Scholar
King, G, Tomz, M and Wittenberg, J (2000) Making the most of statistical analyses: Improving interpretation and presentation. American Journal of Political Science 44, 347–361.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Leppner, MR, Greene, D and Nisbett, RE (1973) Undermining children's interest with extrinsic reward: a test of the overjustification effect. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 28, 129–137.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Manin, B, Przeworski, A and Stokes, S (1999) Elections and representation. In Przeworski, A, Stokes, SC and Manin, B (eds), Democracy, Accountability, and Representation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 29–48.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mayhew, DR (1974) Congress : The Electoral Connection. Yale Studies in Political Science. New Haven etc.: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Norris, P (1997) The puzzle of constituency service. The Journal of Legislative Studies 3, 29–49.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pitkin, HF (1967) The Concept or Representation. Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Searing, DD (1985a) Comment on cain, ferejohn, and fiorina. American Political Science Review 79, 1174–1175.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Searing, DD (1985b) The role of the good constituency member and the practice of representation in Great Britain. The Journal of Politics 47, 347–381.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Selb, P and Lutz, G (2015) Lone fighters: intraparty competition, interparty competition, and candidates' vote seeking efforts in open-ballot PR elections. Electoral Studies 39, 329–337.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Selects (2016) Candidate survey 2015. Technical report, FORS Lausanne. http://www.selects.ch.Google Scholar
White, RW (1959) Motivation reconsidered. Psychological Review 66, 297–333.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Wilson, TD, Hull, JG and Johnson, J (1981) Awareness and self-perception: verbal reports on internal states. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 40, 53–71.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Supplementary material: Link

Giger et al. Dataset

Dataset

https://doi.org/10.7910/DVN/88MXJS
Link
Supplementary material: PDF

Giger et al. supplementary material

Giger et al. supplementary material
Download Giger et al. supplementary material(PDF)
PDF 567 KB